A Saucy week in review, early July 2014

Very interesting week here at The Saucy Dish homestead. My "Pump" challenge group is going very well! A friend has signed herself and me up for a 5K fun-run, and another friend is GIVING us for FREE a treadmill! Whoop Whoop! I lost 7 pounds during the prep for my colonoscopy, and I haven't gained it back! One day at a time. One second, one minute, one hour at a time is really all I can manage, but those minutes, hours, and days have been adding up, and I'm doing really well! I'm also really proud of myself for both my exercising and food choices. There have been moments of weakness, moments where I looked back and thought, "ugh, that was really dumb", but over all, this has been a stellar week.

Ok, I'll back up a little. 

Thursday of last week started with a beautiful surprise in the form of My Honey! He gave us the fabulous gift of his presence. His scheduled day off was Friday, but since that was a holiday, he needed to pick another day off as well and he chose Thursday, giving him a 5-day weekend home with US. It was great! I hadn't realized how much I'd been missing him. 

Friday (7/4) was our 7 year wedding anniversary. And, since it is also The Fourth Of July, we took the kids to see fireworks for the first time. Friends of ours invited us out to their house for supper and to go to a neighboring towns' fireworks display. It was a lot of fun. Easy to get into and out of. We put the girl child in her jammies and pull-up before heading home, and she was asleep before we hit the county line.  

However, we did receive the extremely sad news of the untimely passing of one of our other friends, and a coworker of Mr. Saucy. Understandably, the news put a quick and sad end to the evenings festivities. The news came in right as we were dropping off our friends back at their home.

Saturday was spent with Mr. Saucy spending the day with his friends, remembering the friend that passed. And to be honest, I really can't remember what the kids and I did on Saturday. I was worried about my Honey and his brothers and sisters who were mourning their loss.

Sunday was the prep-day for my colonoscopy on Monday. It involved a clear liquid diet for 2/3 of the day, then in the evening I started the flushing. Quite literally. It flushed me out, and I flushed the potty quite a bit. I spent the day upstairs in bed most of the day. Knowing I wouldn't get much sleep that night because there was another scheduled dose of flushing-meds at 1:30am, and a prescribed water-drinking regiment following that, I wanted to nap and rest as much as possible during the day on Sunday. I also wanted to stay away from the food in the house. Out of sight, out of mind, right? RIIIIIIGHT!

Monday was the scope, and all seems fairly clear. There was a 7mm polyp removed, and the results of the analysis of the tissue should be back within 2 weeks. Being a self proclaimed food addict, I had been thinking of what I wanted to eat as my first meal for about 32 hours, 47 minutes, and 19 seconds. Give or take. Totally thought I wanted a foot long sub from subway. Yes, I know, that's a whole lotta gluten on a fresh clean tummy. But, after the procedure, I decided I wanted a sit-down family lunch at a real restaurant that had menus. Menus brought to the table. And a person with a smiling face asking me what I want. Then a person bringing me said requested food. Then a person taking away the dirty dishes. My only action will be to decide what to eat. We chose a chain restaurant that has a fantastic children's menu and a salad bar. 

I still wasn't really sure what I wanted to eat. Am I going to take this opportunity to stay clean and fresh and healthy, or am I going to gunk up the innards back up with grease and crap? You know, the report COULD still come back in saying the dreaded "C" word on the tissue sample, which may result in a lot more tests, cleaning drugs, maybe even chemo, and I haven't eaten anything in a day and a half, so I can spare the calories to get junk. Right?!?

When the smiling face came to the table to say hi and introduce herself, she asked if we would like cheese fries as an appetizer. Without even a FLINCH, I yelled, "YES! Yes we would!" I then ordered a cheese burger with BBQ sauce and onion rings ON the burger. And the salad bar. Gotta admit, I was irritated when I got to the end of the salad bar and discovered they did not have honey mustard dressing. Grrrr. So, I chose blue cheese. The cheese fries came, and they were OK, but not great. Very greasy tasting to me. After my salad, I went back for a big plate of orange wedges and grapes for the kids. When lunch came, I cut my burger in half and started to eat. It, too, tasted like pure grease and salt! Not sure if the kitchen just really really needed to change out their fry-oil, or if my freshly disinfected body was uber sensitive to it, but everything just tasted like old fry grease. I didn't finish my burger.

By the time the check came, I WANTED TO GO HOME! When we got home, the greasy lunch came right back out. And I went back to bed to go to sleep. I didn't eat anything else for the rest of the night.

Tuesday, I woke up feeling pretty good! Mr. Saucy went to work and the kids and I had a fairly typical summer day. A little cartoons, some games, and some time at the pool. I registered both kids for the fall season of T-Ball. Mr. Saucy had a charity soccer game planned for that night, so the girl child and I took the boy to Whardo. We then went across the street to get a fancy iced coffee for me and a juice for her. I grabbed a free bag of used coffee grounds for my garden on the way out the door too.

We returned to the parking lot to wait for practice to be over. While we waited, we enjoyed our beverages, listened to the Frozen soundtrack, and I watched as a MASSIVE thunder-boomer came rolling in. When the top half of a tree in the parking lot snapped off, I called my Honey to see if he was REALLY going to play the game. I also told him I was fully expecting to see a witch on a bicycle fly past the window at any moment. We made it through the storm, came home, and within about 20 minutes, Mr. Saucy came through the door as well. The game was called off on account of the storm. 

I signed Mr. Saucy up to be a BeachBody coach under me, making me an Emerald level coach, giving him the discounts, and giving me the ability to receive free leads. I also made a decision... I had eaten only plants all day. I. Felt. Great. I felt light, energetic, bouncy, happy, and clean.

Wednesday morning I had to confess to my challenge group that I hadn't worked out since Saturday. I then had to get in 2 workouts to try to catch up. But would I have the energy to do a weightlifting workout routine after eating only grease on Monday, then only plants on Tuesday? 

YES. Not only did I have the energy, I felt great! Oh, don't get me wrong, the routines are still HARD, I still despise lunges and "hover's", but while I was sweating, I didn't feel like I was oozing. Everything just felt better, cleaner, and fresher. It's hard to describe, I just felt really GOOD.

Dinner last night was cod, sautéed in a garlic infused olive and coconut oil, then placed on a bed of yellow cherry tomatoes from the back yard, green peas, and a sauce of white wine, lime juice, and the garlic infused oil. It was FANTASTIC!

So... Wait... That's 2 days eating a diet of fish and plants only. Interesting. This feels "right" to me. This feels good. This makes since and makes me happy.

One second, then one minute, then one hour, building up to one day at a time. That's all I can muster. And that's all I can claim. How many times have I proclaimed something on this blog, or on Facebook, to only defy my own words mere moments later?

Today is Thursday, and it's beautiful outside. Nice breeze, the kids are playing nicely, and the boy child is even depooping the yard. A chore that HE chose to be his this week. My lunch today came mostly from the backyard garden. Canned tuna fish mixed with peeled, seeded, and diced cucumbers, a little vidalia onion, a little mayo, salt and pepper stuffed into big beautiful yellow tomatoes that I scooped out the seeds and guts to make little bowls. They were good!

I now have 3 packs of on-sale pork pieces in the slow cooker for Mr. Saucy and the kids. They all love shredded BBQ pork, so I'm making a big batch of just that so I can have it on hand to whip up family dinners and lunches quickly.  I'll sub out a fish on the days I feel the need for meat when I'm cooking something land-animal based for the crew, and we'll ALL eat more fish more often. 

In fact, I saw a recipe the other day for fish tostadas, and since Aunt Gumbdrop sent us a tortilla press as a gift, I can make fresh gluten free corn tortillas here at home. With the tomatoes, peppers, and herbs growing out back, I'll just need to add some store bought pineapple to the mix for a dreamy fresh summer salsa, and 3/4 of the Saucy family already loves beans, so a seafood tostada night sounds like it's definently in the works.

Well, that 'bout wraps up the goings on here. Dogs are still happy and healthy, which reminds me, we started giving Homer St. John's Wart, and it has done an amazing transformation on his anxiety. He use to howl and cry and leap into my lap when the fire trucks went by, but now he just lifts his head, looks at me, waits for them to pass, and puts his head back down. Unless he's outside. He still howls at them when he's outside. Kevin is still the neighborhood pigmy puma. He roams freely, visiting his other families for belly rubs and head scratches. But he always comes home to his Mommy and Daddy at night. Sleeping on one of us, purring loudly. And, I feel obligated to mention that the fish and snails are all doing well, as well. Well, mostly. I think Ceasar, our beta fish, has an aquatic ailment of sorts, but we'll let nature run it's course.

Until next time, stay hungry, play with your food, and get dirty!

-Carter Ann

Week in Review

As you noticed, I did not do a Tuesday Transformation this week. I have been so busy working on my first Team Challenge Group that I didn't remember to blog about my food and weigh loss struggles each day.

So, instead, I'll do a quick week in review. 

It's a crazy hot day here in VA today, so the kids and I are hanging out inside with the AC. Patrick has to work late tonight, so he went in late this morning so he could get the grass cut before work. My lord, I love that man! I did some weeding and then got out the weed killer and sprayed the buggers popping up between the cracks in the driveway, sidewalk, flower beds, and over taking the patio. I don't like to use the weed wacker along the fense line because it cuts into the wood, so I try to keep the grass etc dead along the fense line. The kids playground area also needed a good spray of growth killer, so since it was going to be an inside day for us, I went ahead and sprayed everything this morning. I harvested some of the yellow cherry tomatoes and a few green beans and I pulled back and supported some tomato plants.

Since you're undoubtedly wondering, "What is the Team Challenge Group" she mentioned, I'll tell you.

I'm leading a group of family and friends in a health and fitness challenge for the next 90 days. Some of us are using "Les Mills PUMP", which is a weight lifting program from BeachBody, the company that I'm a health and fitness coach for. This is a program that I absolutely ADORE! It's hard as all get-out, but totally customizable because you put the amount of weight you want onto your barbell. And, the set COMES WITH THE WEIGHTS! I bought an extra set so that Patrick and I could do them together. This was the class that I too at the gym when I was a member there, and I wished they had offered it every single day because I loved it so much. I would do spin class, then pump. Or I would do pump, then yoga. I spend 2 hours a day at the gym when the kids were little, and it was glorious!

We're in our first week, and not everyone is doing PUMP. Most members in my group are using the group as an accountability tool to keep them honest. Knowing they need to check in daily and report on their physical activity and eating is what they need.

Since I'm one of those honest salesmen, I wasn't going to keep anyone from being in my group because they couldn't buy the product. Ideally, yes, I need and want the sales, and the tools that come with the program are worth EVERY PENNY, but if I have friends and family in the group who will benefit by my help, by the groups help, and ultimately be healthier, stronger, and happier, then that's just as important to me.

It would be very difficult to do the challenge without being on Facebook, because that's how we communicate. I have set up a "group" in Facebook that allows me to post the information pertinent to each days activities and goals. It's a lot of fun for me to be the coach too. Remember that whole honest salesman thing...well, I can't and won't tell someone to do something that I, myself, wouldn't do. I was that way as a manager too. You'll see me right along beside my employees doing the grunt work too.

This past week consisted of me posting on my personal Facebook page about the upcoming group and looking to see if anyone was interesting in being a part of it. I got several people asking to join. 17 in total! Only 4 of us are doing the official PUMP program. My coach, my husband, a friend of ours, and myself. Everyone else in the group is using us as motivation and accountability, like I said before.

After reading the Transformation Tuesday posts, a friend of mine suggested I spend a day to prepare healthy food for the week. I've heard this as a suggestion several times before but didn't know what that REALLY meant. Was she cutting celery and carrot sticks and putting them in ziplocks in the fridge, was she cooking meals to freeze and nuke later, was she putting raw foods in marinades and cutting veggies for quick supper prep upon getting home at night? Well... Yeah. She was doing all of the above. But 2 of her suggestions really struck a chord with me, and I followed suit. 

She suggested taking a family pack of chicken or a pork butt and cooking it in the crock pot with mild herbs until it falls apart. Then, she has precooked shredded chicken or pork to use in recipes throughout the week. She can add it to sandwiches, salads, or use it in tacos or enchiladas, etc. She also passed along a recipe for a black bean and corn salad. She knows how much I love corn, and since it's summer and in season, she knew I'd love it. 

I did the chicken in the crockpot. I added dried rosemary, thyme, and bay leaves. We ate it hot that night for supper with rice and peas. Then put the leftovers in the fridge. Plus, we kept the broth, so I have chicken broth to use in other things for the week as well. Patrick cooked the rice in the broth that night, and it was dreamy.

For the black bean salad, I didn't follow her recipe because I'm in my pre-colonoscopy prep-week, and can't have corn as of today, so didn't want to waste what I didn't finish. I soaked the beans over night, then cooked them with bay leaves, dried thyme, and salt the next morning. We had left over grilled bell peppers that I chopped up and added to the cooked and cooled beans. I drizzled extra virgin olive oil all over, added more salt and black pepper, then added a touch of balsamic vinegar. Stir stir stir, taste taste taste. I love the crunch of fresh vegetables, and vidalia onions are in season too, so I diced up half of one into pretty small chunks and added that too. And, when it comes to my black bean refrigerator salads, as I call them, I can't have enough fresh herb, so out to the garden I went. A lot of flat leaf parsley, a little fresh rosemary, sage, oregano, and a good bit of basil and chives. Sort, chop, mix, stir, taste... YUM! Even Conner, at age 5 adores it. 

The next day, lunch was a spectacular collection of shredded chicken, bean salad, fresh beets, and grilled portobello mushrooms.

And, as an added bonus, I signed my first coach. This means that I get to teach her how to be an awesome BeachBody coach as well. If I get another coach under my wing, I'll be promoted to "Emerald" which means I'll receive sales from the customers who purchase BeachBody products from the TV infomercials. Everyone who signs up and/or purchases product either online or through the phone gets their own personal coach, and I'll be in the database to receive those customers and help them as well. BeachBody is NOT a pyramid scheme, as I don't get any money from my coaches sales. Their business is their business. My coach doesn't get any money from my sales either. We get points based on how well our team does, and those points add up to prizes etc, but it's not like Pampered Chef or Mary Kay in the realm of the more people you sign, the more money you build from their hard work. And there are no horrible parties! Ugh! I despise the direct sales home parties with a passion. The pressure, guilt, etc... It's brutal.

In addition to all the health and fitness joy, I had my first Etsy sale this week too! A friend of mine bought 2 pint glasses, and she should be getting them today. I'm looking forward to hearing from her. Want to be sure they got to her without breaking, and make sure she likes them.

I got a blow torch this week too and tried using it to melt the edges of the freshly cut glass to get that professional looking rolled edge. This didn't work very well. I ended up shattering more glass than smoothing edges. I'll practice more when it's not over 100 degrees outside. I need a vise grip that I can mount onto something stable to hold the pieces. For this first practice round, I put the pieces on a cookies sheet and placed the cookie sheet inside our outside grill. Some of them worked, some of them did not. Some wine bottles are MUCH thicker than others. I'm starting to learn by feel which ones will cut well and which ones will be a disaster. The same will hold true for melting them as well, I'm sure.

I cut several hurricanes to put in the Etsy shop this past week. I need to get more pint and rocks glasses cut as well. I think I'm out of pint glasses after giving the first set to FunnyGrandDaddy, and selling the other set this week.

I added wooden trays made from pallet wood to the inventory as well. I need to get the pictures together for them, get them posted in my shop, and get more cut and put together. They're beautiful!

The McClellands camped out in the back yard this past weekend too. It was fun. It really was. All 4 humans and 2 gigantic dogs slept in the tent. I bought a tent that could sleep 6, and I'm SO glad I did! It has enough room for the 2 queen air mattresses and room in between for us to play games and walk without stepping on the beds and sleeping bags. We chopped wood, had a nice fire in the fire pit, and grilled our fresh veggie supper on the grill. We ate outside by candle/tiki-torch light, then sang songs and ate dessert of fresh blueberries and grilled peaches drizzled with honey. It really was a great time.

In addition to the events already told of above, we went to the pool, played in the sprinkler, had a water balloon fight with the neighbor, I managed to read another few pages of a book without pictures, and we gave the house a deep clean. 

Oh yeah, and the girl-child flushed a bath toy down the upstairs potty, requiring us to enlist the help of our next door neighbor (a plumber) to auger, then pull the toilet to fish out the toy. Which, funny as it is, was a fish. Exactly like this one.

At least she picked a toy that we had a duplicate of, so I could easily let our neighbor-rescuer know what he was looking for.

Hope you all had a fun week yourselves, and hopefully ours will be ever so slightly less exciting next week.

Stay hungry, play with your food, get dirty, and have fun.